Tchaikovsky, Pyotr Il'yich (1840–1893)

Russian composer Pyotr Il'ych Tchaikovsky (1840–1893). Tchaikovsky is best loved for his ballets Swan Lake, The Nutcracker, and Sleeping Beauty. Mystery surrounds his death: the official cause of death is usually given as cholera, but there were rumours that he was induced to commit suicide, to avoid a scandal after allegations of an affair with the son of a nobleman.

Russian composer. He successfully united Western European influences with native Russian musical material and tradition, and was the first Russian composer to establish a reputation with Western audiences. His strong sense of melody, personal expression, and brilliant orchestration are clear throughout his many Romantic works, which include six symphonies, three piano concertos, a violin concerto, operas (including Eugene Onegin (1879)), ballets (including The Nutcracker (1892)), orchestral fantasies (including Romeo and Juliet (1869)), and chamber and vocal music.

Tchaikovsky's father, an inspector of mines, allowed him to have music lessons from the age of four. The family moved to St Petersburg in 1848; he received more teaching there and in 1850 was sent to the School of Jurisprudence, which he left in 1859 to become a clerk in the Ministry of Justice. He approached music as an amateur, but in 1862 entered the newly opened St Petersburg Conservatory, having already studied with Nikolai Zaremba, and had lessons in orchestration from Anton Rubinstein. Nikolai Rubinstein, having opened a similar conservatory in Moscow, employed him as professor of harmony in 1865, and there he began to compose seriously and professionally. In 1868 he met Mily Alexeyevich Balakirev and his circle of nationalist composers in St Petersburg, but he remained separate from them. In the same year his first symphony Winter Daydreams was successfully performed in Moscow; it is a very fresh and youthful work. His first opera The Voyevoda was premiered at the Bolshoi Theatre in 1869 and Romeo and Juliet in 1870. The second symphony, a distinctly nationalist work, was performed in 1873, and the B♭ minor piano concerto, though at first rejected by Nikolai Rubinstein, was given at Boston by Hans von Bülow in 1875 and given its first Moscow performance later that year by Alexander Taneiev. In 1876 he began a correspondence with Nadezhda von Meck, the widow of a wealthy engineer. She greatly admired his work and made him an allowance so that he could compose without any financial worries, but she never met him face to face. His first important opera, Vakula the Smith, was premiered in 1876 and the following year the first of his great ballets, Swan Lake, was premiered at the Bolshoi. The hero's name (Siegfried) probably comes from Richard Wagner's Ring, which Tchaikovsky had just seen at Bayreuth. Also in 1877 he married Antonina Milyukova; but he was an undeclared homosexual and left her less than a month after the wedding, on the verge of mental collapse. After some months in Switzerland and Italy, he resigned the post at the Moscow Conservatory and lived in the country, wholly devoted to composition. The first of his highly popular symphonies, No. 4 in F minor, was premiered in 1878. Eugene Onegin (1879) mirrors some of the recent circumstances of Tchaikovsky's own life; Tatiana writes a hopeful love letter to the reluctant Onegin just as Antonina had done to Tchaikovsky. The brilliant orchestral work the Violin Concerto in D was given at Vienna in 1881, and seven years later he composed one of the most powerful of his symphonies, No. 5 in E minor. In 1888 he made his first international tour as conductor of his own works, which became known in many countries, and the following year he completed the finest of his three ballets, The Sleeping Beauty, which was first performed in 1890. In 1890 he had a misunderstanding with Mme von Meck which brought their friendship by correspondence to an end. By that time he was quite able to earn his own living. He visited the USA in 1892 and London in the summer of 1893, when he received an honorary degree from Cambridge University. On his return to Russia he completed his Symphony No. 6 in B Minor (Pathétique), which was first performed at St Petersburg in October. This work is now considered to be his masterpiece and shows great maturity and mastery of structure in its gradually unfolding form. Nine days after its performance Tchaikovsky was dead; the cause of death is usually given as cholera, although it has recently been suggested that he took poison at the order of a secret court of honour. The court had been set up to avoid a scandal after allegations of a liaison between him and an aristocrat's nephew. However, the real facts will probably never be known.

Works Stage the operas Eugene Onegin (1879), Maid of Orleans (1881), The Queen of Spades (1890); ballets Swan Lake (1877), The Sleeping Beauty (1890), and The Nutcracker (1892).

Orchestral seven symphonies: no. 1 in G minor (Winter Daydreams, 1866, revised 1874), no. 2 in C minor (Little Russian, 1872, revised 1880), no. 3 in D (Polish, 1875), no. 4 in F minor (1878), no. 5 in E minor (1888), no. 6 in B minor (Pathétique, 1893), no. 7 in E♭ (unfinished, 1892); Manfred symphony (after Byron (1885); fantasy-overture Romeo and Juliet (1869), Capriccio italien, Serenade for string orchestra (1880), overture The Year 1812 (1880); three piano concertos, including no. 1 in B♭ minor (1875), violin concerto (1878), Variations on a Rococo Theme for cello and orchestra (1876).

Chamber string sextet Souvenir de Florence (1887), three string quartets (1871, 1874, 1876), piano trio (1882); 17 Op. nos. of piano compositions including The Seasons; 13 Op. nos. of songs (nearly 100).